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Pakistan’s MQM ‘received Indian funding’

9 years ago | Posted in: Latest Politics News, Pakistan, World | 958 Views

Officials in Pakistan’s MQM party have told the UK authorities they received Indian government funds, the BBC learnt from an authoritative Pakistani source.
UK authorities investigating the MQM for alleged money laundering also found a list of weapons in an MQM property.

A Pakistani official has told the BBC that India has trained hundreds of MQM militants over the past 10 years.

The Indian authorities described the claims as “completely baseless”. The MQM also strongly denied the claims.

Party spokesman Saif Muhammad Ali told BBC Urdu that the MQM had never received any funding or training from India. He said authorities in Pakistan were running a campaign against the party.

With 24 members in the National Assembly, the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) has long been a dominant force in the politics of Pakistan’s largest city, Karachi.

British authorities held formal recorded interviews with senior MQM officials who told them the party was receiving Indian funding, the BBC was told.

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Meanwhile a Pakistani official has told the BBC that India has trained hundreds of MQM militants in explosives, weapons and sabotage over the past 10 years in camps in north and north-east India.
Before 2005-2006 the training was given to a small number of mid-ranking members of the MQM, the official said.

More recently, greater numbers of more junior party members have been trained.

The claims follow the statement of a senior Karachi police officer that two arrested MQM militants said they had been trained in India. In April, Rao Anwar gave details of how the two men went to India via Thailand to be trained by the Indian intelligence agency RAW.

In response, MQM leader Altaf Hussain issued a tirade of abuse at Rao Anwar.
Asked about the claims of Indian funding and training of the MQM, the Indian High Commission in London said: “Shortcomings of governance cannot be rationalised by blaming neighbours.”
The UK authorities started investigating the MQM in 2010 when a senior party leader, Imran Farooq, was stabbed to death outside his home in north London.

In the course of those inquiries the police found around £500,000 ($787,350) in the MQM’s London offices and in the home of MQM leader Altaf Hussain. That prompted a second investigation into possible money laundering.

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source: bbc.com

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